Law in the Liberal Arts

Should law be left to the lawyers? Is legal education properly understood as technical education? Law in the Liberal Arts answers "no" and suggests that our society is not well served by the current professionalization of legal knowledge. An ideal approach to legal education, in Austin Sarat's view, would open up law and legal knowledge by making them the proper objects of inquiry in the liberal arts.

Legal education in the United States is generally located in law schools dedicated to professional training. Sarat believes that this situation impoverishes our ability to see the complex relations of law, culture, and society in all their variety and to connect theorizing about law with its application in the humanities and social sciences. The contributors to this book aim to assess the place of legal scholarship in the liberal arts by asking whether and how legal research and pedagogy are different in liberal arts settings than they are in law schools.

Law in the Liberal Arts

"Sarat and his colleagues have done a superb job of defending law as a liberal art, differentiating it from law as vocational training while never losing sight of the noble purpose served by each."—R. J. Steamer, Choice, September 2005

Law in the Liberal Arts

"Should a liberal arts education exclude the study of law? In this fascinating collection, leading law and society scholars argue that the study of law raises basic moral, philosophical, and political questions. They offer provocative ideas about where and how law should fit into a liberal arts education. This book is essential reading for anyone seeking a new perspective on liberal arts education or the possibilities of education in the law."—Sally Engle Merry, Wellesley College

Law in the Liberal Arts

"I found Law in the Liberal Arts to be a welcome contribution: it is creatively conceived, provocative, and edifying. The chapters are interesting and intelligent; it was rewarding to engage them, think through issues long on the periphery of my intellectual consciousness, and take in some new insights and points of reference."—Michael W. McCann, University of Washington

Law in the Liberal Arts

"Austin Sarat and the contributors to this collection make engaging arguments in favor of legal education as education and law as central to liberal arts education in the United States today."—Carol J. Greenhouse, Princeton University

Law in the Liberal Arts

"Law in the Liberal Arts makes a persuasive argument that teaching law should have a central place in the liberal arts. It also makes the more radical claim that our understanding of law needs to be rescued from the law schools. If learning to think like a lawyer is what law school teaches, we also need to step outside the practice of the law and bring to bear on its study critical theory and disciplines of reading learned in the liberal arts."—Peter Brooks, University of Virginia